Aside on Christ figures in TBotNS

John Watkins · 12 Dec 2008, 22:12 · from 2008-December.txt.gz

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From: john.watkins04 at gmail.com (John Watkins)
Date: Fri, 12 Dec 2008 17:12:17 -0500
Subject: (urth) Aside on Christ figures in TBotNS
In-Reply-To: <W1887622363104491229119414@webmail19>
References: <W1887622363104491229119414@webmail19>
Message-ID: <93d4039f0812121412ha7f4e99m806f32a53a8af0bc at mail.gmail.com>

On 12/12/08, Son of Witz <sonofwitz at butcherbaker.org> wrote:
>
> >He's a Sufficiently Advanced Alien.  Such creatures are
> >indistinguishable from gods from a mortal viewpoint (although not, of
> >course, from the viewpoint of the Increate.)
>
>
> What if the Archangel Gabriel is a Sufficiently Advanced Alien?
> does that change anything? everything?
> or is the Sufficiently Advanced Alien still on a mission from on high?
> Can only Angels work Gods plan, or can Aliens too?

Are you asking for my philosophical and theological speculation, or
are you asking about the teachings of the ancient Christian churches?

> I think the Heirogrammites and Heirodules are the same entities that past speculation has called Archangels and Angels.

You may be right.  But this is Gene Wolfe's book, and we're led to
believe that Gene Wolfe is an orthodox Roman Catholic (heck, a
Thomist!).  As such he likely believes traditional Christian doctrines
concerning angels.

>That EITHER of those characters are "real" is HIGHLY unlikely,

I don't think Wolfe agrees.  That is, I think he believes in the
Archangel Gabriel, and made an effort to faithfully depict him in his
short story, The Queen, much as he made an effort to faithfully depict
the Archangel Michael in The Wizard Knight.

Whether or not Tzadkiel is meant to similarly depict an angelic being
is up to debate--I think it's more likely that Tzadkiel is meant as a
parody of an angelic being, or as a deconstruction of the idea of an
angelic being than as a faithful depiction of the higher powers as
Wolfe understands them.  But that's just my interpretation.

>but the prospect that these "characters" are trying to express some higher being >that IS existent seems much more likely to me. This is where Wolfe keeps it >ambiguous and leaves it to faith.

That he does.

> ~SonOfWitz
>
>
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